What your business needs for re-opening after lockdown

Reopening in a post-lockdown world.

There's a lot of conflicting news, advice and stories circulating surrounding what should and shouldn't be done when re-opening your shop, pub or other workplace after the lockdown is over. In this post, we hope to shed some light on the subject, and provide you with an insight into how you can make your workplace safer for you, your staff and your customers after the lockdown caused by COVID-19.

So, how can I make my workplace safer?

1. Scrub, sanitise and sneeze guards.

Without a doubt, one of the main ways you can help prevent the spread of COVID-19 in your shop is to make sure that you are keeping high hygiene standards. By making sure that hygiene levels are improved and exceed what they would normally be, you are reducing the likelihood that you have COVID-19 lingering on your counter-top, shelves or products. You can also increase the hygiene of your workplace by putting physical barriers in place between yourself and your staff.

​How can I make my workplace more hygienic?

• Purchase one of our Sneeze Guards, which forms a physical barrier between you, your staff, and your customers. With areas for transactions of goods underneath, they cause minimal disruption to your workplace routines. They are also fully customisable, meaning your sneeze guard shouldn't stick out like a sore thumb, and can be printed to match your brand image.
• Set up, or increase your cleaning timetables. If you don't already have a workplace cleaning schedule - get one! If you already have a workplace cleaning schedule - double it! By increasing the cleaning of your shelves, products and floors to more than once a day, you can help prevent the spread of COVID-19 inside your workplace.
• Reduce points of contact. This means optimising your workplace for contactless transactions, and making customers aware that they shouldn't touch items unless they intend to buy them!

2. Enforce social distancing inside your workplace

We've heard nothing but 'social distancing' since COVID-19 first hit headlines, and for good reason too. Social distancing is a great way to help prevent the spread of the coronavirus, as it increases the distance between yourself, your customers and your employees. By increasing this distance, the likelihood of the disease spreading decreases, as it makes coughs, sneezes or other bodily fluids more difficult to come into contact with.

What are the best ways to enforce social distancing?

• Fit vinyl floor stickers every two metres, to indicate the distance that should be kept when queueing, or looking around in a shop.
• Only allow a certain number of people inside at one time, this can be enforced with a pavement sign, telling potential customers to wait at the entrance until they're told to enter the shop.
• Remind customers to keep their distance at every opportunity, this can be achieved by displaying posters in windows and on walls, as well as printing the message onto sneeze guards at the counter or on your bar.
• Communicate via social media, or your website, with customers. This can help spread the message of the precautions you're taking inside your shop.
• Increase the space between shelves, chairs, or other furniture, to help people maintain 2 metres when passing in aisles or walking around your workplace.

3. Talk to your staff

Staff are a crucial element to any business. That's why it's important to consult them when making decisions like these, which may well affect their livelihood. It's important to make sure that you talk the measures through with your staff members, and find an agreement in which you can open your workplace, and they will still feel safe.

How should I tell my staff we're re-opening?

• Understandably, many of your staff members may be reluctant to return to work, especially if they feel that their safety may be compromised at work. By talking to them about the social distancing measures, as well as hygiene measures that you are putting in place, you can hopefully reassure them that you have their best interests at heart.
• Explain to staff that they must maintain social distancing measures. By doing this, you can help ensure that if one of your staff members is unfortunate enough to catch COVID-19, it doesn't spread throughout your business.

You're ready to go!

Now that you've thought about how to re-open your workplace safely, you should be ready to re-open. This is the advice from our point of view, so you will still need to let your suppliers know that you are planning to be back up and running, to make sure that your business can run smoothly after lockdown. If you'd like to enquire about any of the products mentioned in this article, see our page on our range of COVID-19 safety products.